British mother facing death penalty over cocaine arrest

A British mother of two is facing the death penalty in Indonesia after being
arrested for allegedly trying to smuggle more than £1.6 million worth of
cocaine into Bali in her luggage.

Lindsay Sandiford is escorted by custom officers in DenpasarPhoto: AFP/GETTY

By Sarah Dougherty, Denpasar

8:59PM BST 28 May 2012

Lindsay Sandiford, 55, a former legal costs secretary, was caught with 4.8kg of the drug stuffed in the lining of her suitcase as she landed on the island aboard a flight from Bangkok.

Following her arrest, she agreed to take part in a “sting” operation which resulted in police swooping on four other suspects including three Britons – two men and a woman – and an Indian.

The head of Bali’s drugs squad said the two British men, who have not been named, were believed to be senior figures in a major drug-smuggling syndicate.

Mrs Sandiford is believed to have told police she only agreed to smuggle the drugs because her two sons, who are aged 22 and 24, were being threatened. Appearing at a press conference wearing a prison T-shirt, Mrs Sandiford was paraded in front of the haul of drugs.

Masked and armed officers in Kuta, a town on the holiday island, flanked her as she was brought into the room, while a customs official cut open brown tape packages to reveal a white powder.

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Mrs Sandiford was stopped as she arrived at Bali’s Ngurah Rai International Airport from Bangkok, Thailand, on May 19. After she agreed to take part in the undercover operation, police monitored her closely as she was contacted by a second British woman at a pre-arranged meeting point.

Officers then moved in and detained three other people once the drugs changed hands.

Made Wijaya, a customs official, said: “After weighing, the total cocaine is 4.791kg. The drugs have an estimated street value of 23.9 billion Indonesian rupiah [£1.6 million]. “This is a big international network. The charge against them would carry the death penalty.”

Mrs Sandiford is originally from Redcar in Teesside, but has lived in London and Cheltenham.

She gave birth to her first son, Lewis Michael, in 1988 and two years later had a second child, Eliot, who had learning difficulties. She married their father Nicholas in London in 1994, but the couple later split and she moved to Cheltenham in Gloucestershire.

One resident there described her as the “neighbour from hell” who would regularly host late-night parties.

But a family friend said he would never have expected her to become involved in drug smuggling. “I was very shocked when I found out.

“She was always a party girl but I didn’t think she was capable of this.”